50 Best, the organisation behind The World’s 50 Best Restaurants and Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants, among other rankings, is pleased to announce two new Academy Chair appointments to head up its restaurants voting panels for specific regions of the world with immediate effect.

Alexandra Carlton will oversee The World’s 50 Best Restaurants voting panel in Oceania – taking over as Academy Chair from the legendary Pat Nourse – covering Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific Islands. Alex has been a journalist for almost 20 years and writes about food, restaurants and travel for titles such as Escape, Gourmet Traveller and The Australian. She is based in Sydney but travels nationally and internationally regularly.

Nicola Lee is appointed Academy Chair for South-East Asia (South). Replacing Evelyn Chen, Nicola’s role will cover the voting for Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants and The World’s 50 Best Restaurants, and her region comprises Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines. As well as an established business leader, Nicola is a respected food and drink aficionado, contributing to titles such as Tatler Asia and RadarList. She is based in Singapore.

Nicola Lee

 William Drew, Director of Content for 50 Best, says: “We are excited and honoured to welcome these two outstanding individuals to the 50 Best Academy Chair network, each covering such a vibrant and diverse culinary region. I would also like to take this opportunity to thank our outgoing Academy Chairs for their contribution and support.

“Evelyn Chen took over in her part of South-East Asia almost a decade ago and has helped establish Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants as the region’s premium guide, as well as witnessing the ongoing rise of Asian gastronomy in global terms. We are indebted to Evelyn for her work in helping us organise editions of Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants and The World’s 50 Best Restaurants in Singapore.

“Pat Nourse, our longest-ever-serving Academy Chair, has been our Antipodean guru since back in 2006, and was a generous host to many when we staged The World’s 50 Best Restaurants in Melbourne in 2017. Hugely knowledgeable, ever helpful and widely respected, Pat will be missed by the 50 Best family, but has no plans to retire his passport any time soon. He steps aside with our best wishes and deepest thanks.”

Academy system

To ensure a fair representation of the global restaurant scene, The World’s 50 Best Restaurants divides the world into 27 geographical regions. Each region has an Academy Chair appointed for their knowledge of their part of the restaurant world, their independence and their contacts across the gastronomic sector. The Academy Chairs, all of whom take on the voluntary (unpaid) role, select their voting panels made up of 40 experts each, ensuring a balanced range of chefs, restaurateurs, food writers, restaurant critics and well-travelled gourmets. These 1080 voters make up The World’s 50 Best Restaurants Academy, which is gender-balanced. Regular rotation of Academy Chairs helps ensure the makeup of the Academy remains fresh.

Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants currently sees each of the six Academy Chairs in the continent recruit 53 voters, totalling 318 experts from across Asia who make up Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants Academy. The voting for Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants takes place at a different time to The World’s 50 Best Restaurants with a different voting Academy. It is naturally focused on restaurants in Asia only. This process, therefore, produces other rankings of The World’s 50 Best Restaurants.

For more information on all the Academy Chairs, visit https://www.theworlds50best.com/voting/the-academy.

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